Give It Time
by Mustardlover16
Summary: A little one shot set after season 9. The Doctor is alone with some of his thoughts after...Well, you know. Anyway, he's missing Clara-even though he doesn't know what he's missing. Or does he?


When you're immortal you learn quickly (or, rather very slowly) not to trust people, and that, conversely, you must trust people always.

You must learn the difference between their truth and your truth. That way, when they tell you things like, "Don't worry, daft old man. I'm not going anywhere." You can be ready when they are inevitably wrong.

You must learn not to hold it against them when they are wrong. They don't mean to lie. It's just that they could not possibly understand all of the things that the universe has burned into your brain.

Know that there are almost unending variants of the truth. All of them are painful.

Know that pain is often useful, often necessary but always inevitable.

You will come to understand that you hardly ever have time for please and thank you and I love you but that they are almost always necessary.

You must realize that if you fail to say what you need to, you will always regret it.

Know that regret is the longest lasting of all emotions. It outlives happiness, grief, anger. It outlives your friends. It will almost definitely outlive you.

When you're immortal you get used to never sleeping because all it does is bring back memories you'd rather suppress. Memories that don't make sense, memories that make too much sense. Memories that cause pain though you can't explain why.

That's another thing. You learn to constantly adapt to survive. You learn that the first rule of surviving immortality is the repression of memories.

It's almost always better to forget.

Almost.

Except.

Except, in the immortal words of some unfortunate boy in that Timeless classic, "I can't remember what I've forgotten."

There are just these gaps. These little spaces. I know something important used to fill these places. I just don't know what it was. Or who it was.

I grieve. Sometimes I'm flying the Tardis through the 8th Nebula, just past a moon now under Sontaron rule and I feel a tear drip down my cheek.

Sometimes I find writing on the backside of one of my chalkboards. Handwriting I'm almost sure isn't mine.

Or I'll find things. Human things- a hairbrush, a cell phone, a silly little book for kids with an unexplainable leaf pressed between the pages. Things I am quite sure are not mine but which I'm sure I don't know the origin of.

It's like someone was living in the Tardis- _my Tardis w_ ithout my knowing. Which, of course, is impossible. Do you hear me? It is impossible. And speaking from a position uniquely qualified in the subject of impossible things, it is _impossible_.

Impossible.

Just know that when you're immortal, many things are made clear to you, just through happenstance and perspective.

Know that when you're immortal that many, many more things make no sense to you.

It makes no sense that I could know someone, love someone and not remember them.

Grasp that when you live forever, impossible is not as hard to come by as you might think. Not as hard to come by as you might hope.

Know that when you have spanned the universe, lived for over two thousand years, have loved and lost have read and seen and heard and spoken all that there is-know that when all of these are true for you-that impossible is what you cling to.

Appreciate the fact that you will hate people, love people, miss people, meet people. Know that all of them are important. No, stop it. Stop whatever it is you are doing or thinking. Just stop and shut up and _listen._ This is important. Know that every person is important. _EVERY PERSON IS IMPORTANT._ Have you got that? Perhaps you should write it down. Your little brain doesn't absorb much but if it must absorb one thing, absorb this. _EVERY PERSON THAT HAS EVER EXISTED IS INATELY, UNQUESTIONABLY, PROFOUNDLY IMPORTANT._

Realize that, because I am much smarter than you-or rather I have just had 2000 more years to be as stupid as you are- I _know_ that every person matters.

Which is why I must remember this gap. This hole in my failed memory. I only forget what I intentionally don't remember, but I cannot recall ever purposely forgetting the only things that are worth remembering-people.

In fact it is entirely impossible that I would forget a person.

I only remember pieces. Well, you could hardly even call them pieces. Calling them pieces gives them too much substance. I remember shadows. No, that's not right either. Call them... Sparks. Little sparks which burst, which are bright, and significant and beautiful but which last only milliseconds, leaving only a contorted and blinding afterimage.

I remember... _hair._ Brown. Shortish. Flipping. Hair.

I remember... _Sass._ I can hear this clear voice, but I can't hear the words. All I know is that they are talking back to me. I remember pretending not to like it.

I remember love. Feeling loved. Feeling overwhelming, unimaginable and brilliant love. Feeling love towards...her. She.

My gap is a she. I remember that my impossible...whatever...I remember my impossible person is a girl. _My impossible girl._

I remember a smile.

Know that often times, forgetting is easier.

Always remember that forgetting is less painful.

Understand that forgetting-especially for someone my age- is understandable.

Know that it is impossible that I would allow myself to forget what could be the most important girl in all of human history. Who knows? I mightn't.

Yet.

But know that it is impossible that I will let one person, one friend, one crying child be forgotten.

I will always remember that the impossible is quite ordinary for me. And that the impossible things- _the impossible people-_ they are always remembered.

Just give it time.

 **A/N: This is just a little drabble that leaked out of my brain. I was really heart broken when Clara...died? Lol, who knows what happened to that girl, but at any rate I kind of like this one. Anyway, this is just my version of what the Doctor is going through in his PCSD (Post Clara Stress Disorder) which, by the way, I have been suffering from since the episode aired. Tell me what you think-review and all that.**


End file.
